1970 Plymouth Cuda AAR

The 1970 Plymouth AAR ‘Cuda was not your typical muscle car. It was designed with modest-engine racers in mind, built to compete on twisting road courses. What Plymouth built was a Street-Rod!

 

In 1970, Plymouth entered SCCA Trans-Am racing, contracting with Dan Gurney’s All American Racers (AAR) to build and campaign cars to be driven by him and Swede Savage. At that time, SCCA homologation requirements dictated that a manufacturer build a minimum of 2,500 street versions in order to compete. The single-production-year  AAR ’Cuda met the homologation requirements with 2,724 cars built, all during a five-week period between March and April 1970.

 

There were 1,120 produced with manual 4-speed transmissions, and the remaining 1,614 had the automatic 3-speed transmissions. There were only 118 AAR Cudas painted in the “In Violet” color you see here.

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Background on the paint colors:

 Chrysler launched their optional High Impact Paint colors in the summer of 1969. These unique options have always made Chrysler muscle cars stand out and generations of Mopar fans are thankful. Chrysler led the charge in providing high-profile paint options, which distinguished the muscle car era. Aside from offering a much more colorful palette, Chrysler’s colors could also be placed on nearly any model, unlike the competition who limited their few exciting enamels to performance models only. Today, High Impact Paints (HIP) have become incredibly desirable and increase the value of a classic Mopar vehicle tremendously, although when originally ordered, these new pretty pigments only set customers back an extra $15! Chrysler’s High Impact Paints were available from 1969 through 1973 and included ten captivating new colors.

One of the most desirable hues was a purple known as Plum Crazy for the Dodge products and In-Violet for Plymouth. These are the same paint, paint code FC7, with different names for Dodge and Plymouth. Other color names included Lemon Twist/Top Banana, Tor-Red/Hemi Orange, Moulin Rouge/Panther Pink, and Sassy Grass/Green Go, to name a few.